1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to systems and methods of configuring marine vessel hulls with combination hull arrangements, and more specifically to systems and methods of configuring a hull with combination hull arrangements that utilize aerodynamic and hydrodynamic effects to provide broader ranges of performance benefits than are provided by uncombined hull arrangements.
2. Related Art
Marine vessels may encounter widely varying conditions and can be asked to perform well in a broad range of tasks. A broad variety of hull arrangements have been devised in order to provide performance benefits that are particularly well suited for certain tasks or conditions. While many of these individual hull arrangements are advantageous for accomplishing certain objectives they have been devised for, there often are also significant limitations in the range of situations in which they are capable of performing well. These limitations can be generally characterized in at least one of two ways. The first characterization is the type of function at which the vessel can perform well, and the second characterization is the type of conditions in which the vessel can operate well. Frequently, limitations characterized in one way are also capable of being characterized in the other way.
For marine vessels, designs intended to provide certain functional capabilities must also take into account both the conditions in which the vessel will normally operate, as well as the potential for the vessel to encounter less customary or even extreme conditions. Often, designs are primarily optimized for the normal operating conditions, while some provision, often limited, is made for the less common conditions. For example, a V-hull design provides capabilities of traversing waters with significant waves while lessening their jarring effects by virtue of its ability to “cut” through the waves. However, a V-hull is also susceptible to greater rolling, for example due to steering changes, and is less efficient when moving at high speeds across relatively calm waters than are flatter bottom hulls or catamarans which will normally plane more easily. By the same token, those hulls that plane most easily, and hence are more efficient for travel at higher speeds, are also more susceptible to being adversely affected by larger waves, and their uses can be limited by their difficulties in handling turbulent waters.
One approach to surmounting these limitations has been to develop hull designs that amalgamate aspects of disparate hull designs. Hulls which attempt to combine the virtues of both V-shapes and efficient planing bottom shapes are frequently compromises that may not perform either task optimally, but hope to at least avoid the worst performance problems of both. In some designs, hull step(s) are also utilized to attempt to facilitate easier planing. While some of these approaches have managed to avoid various performance deficits of certain single-shape hull designs, or expand the range of conditions in which a vessel can operate well, there remain substantial amounts of improvement in both performance gains and reductions in condition-based limitations that are desirable, but not yet available.